


but you're human tonight

by psikeval



Series: find some peace inside yourself; lay down your heavy load [1]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Age Difference, Body Worship, M/M, Praise Kink, Unrequited Lafayette/Washington
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-04
Updated: 2016-01-04
Packaged: 2018-05-11 19:23:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5638984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/psikeval/pseuds/psikeval
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I wasn’t sure where to go. I thought of here because at least it was Alexander’s home, for a time.”</p><p>“Your home, too,” says Mulligan firmly. “Whenever you need it.”</p><p>“Thank you.” He tries his best to straighten his shoulders from their sad and tired slump, this twenty-year old general in Washington’s army. It makes Mulligan’s heart ache with pride—with other things, less welcome. So young, so far from home, and Lafayette has done so much.</p>
            </blockquote>





	but you're human tonight

 

An unexpected knock on his door late at night is almost always cause for alarm, in Hercules Mulligan’s carefully regulated world. His few informants only make contact by appointment, Cato will be traveling north for at least a week, and the shop is quite obviously closed for business, even if someone thought this a reasonable hour to go looking for a tailor.

So he approaches his door with caution. Not armed, of course—in most situations the work of explaining a gun in the hand of a fashionable tailor would outweigh any of its benefits.

No. Whatever’s waiting for him, Mulligan has no doubt he’s talked his way out of worse.

He opens the door in one smooth movement, his expression one of sleepy, polite curiosity. An honest, dependable businessman disturbed from his nightly routine, nothing more. _Good evening,_ Mulligan means to say, before he recognizes Lafayette and all the pretense melts away into a huge, delighted grin.

“Gilbert!” he says, the flat pronunciation full of hard consonants that Lafayette despises, just to see the familiar annoyed and reluctant flicker of a smile touch his lips. “Come here!”

It’s the easiest hug he’s gotten from Lafayette in ages—he and Hamilton left for the war proud and stubborn, certain of being men too fully grown to suffer embraces. Even before, when Lafayette would spend his spare time flirting with Mulligan, disrupting his work — entertainment devised, no doubt, for the times when Alexander and John were too entirely wrapped up in each other — he’d rarely come close enough for Hercules to touch.

Now, Lafayette steps close and folds his long arms around Mulligan, drops his head without hesitation onto Mulligan’s shoulder, where it rests like dead weight. “It’s good to see you,” he sighs, muffled, and after that Mulligan holds on a little bit longer that he’d meant to.

“All right,” he finally says, retreating gruffly into the comfortable role of caretaker. God knows someone has to look after these boys. “Get your ass inside, you look dead on your feet.”

He ushers Lafayette into the house with one hand on his back and tries not to feel slighted when Lafayette almost immediately shies away from the touch, holding himself apart as if to compensate for his moment of weakness. Mulligan can’t tell if it’s pride reasserting itself or something worse, but he’s got a bad feeling in his gut. Call it a hunch.

There’s something wrong here, Mulligan would bet on it. He frowns, runs a fingernail absently over the pad of his thumb, and follows Lafayette without trying to touch him again.

He expects they’ll go to the parlor or the dining room, somewhere they might easily sit and talk, but instead Lafayette walks right into Mulligan’s rooms, the workspace taking up half the first floor and his bedroom beyond. Perhaps it’s only force of habit. After all, he always used to make a beeline here, when visiting, to provide his usual torment, flirting while draped temptingly over furniture and generally chipping away at Mulligan’s sanity.

Hercules remembers finding the visits unbearable, but cannot at this moment remember why. Those were simpler times, the boys engrossed in their studies and speeches and Mulligan only their loud, affable, oversexed guardian.

This is the first time he’s had to approach Lafayette as a spy, with subtlety and caution instead of overt affection. There’s a certain welcome honesty in that, of course. There were times Mulligan was all too aware of handling the boys gently, sparing them the necessity of seeing all he is and all he knows; the war has changed that for them, and it’s liberating. Lafayette is a general now. They are equals.

He does not, in all honesty, know what they are to each other anymore.

Lafayette circles the room rather than stop, his steps unevenly paced and aimless. He runs his fingers over some fabric samples on the smaller table, then withdraws his hand so quickly he can only have remembered Mulligan’s habitual refrain of _Gil, don’t touch that_. It nearly makes Mulligan smile, until he sees how Lafayette is standing, terribly still now, hunched in on himself.

“I asked for leave.” Lafayette laughs then, the mocking edge of it aimed only at himself, and Mulligan hates the sound with a ferocity that shocks him. “I asked for it and then wasn’t sure where to go. I thought of here because at least it was Alexander’s home, for a time.”

“Your home, too,” says Mulligan firmly. “Whenever you need it.”

“Thank you.” He tries his best to straighten his shoulders from their sad and tired slump, this twenty-year old general in Washington’s army. It makes Mulligan’s heart ache with pride—with other things, less welcome. So young, so far from home, and Lafayette has done so much.

His reluctance to speak is palpable. After a minute’s silence has been marked by the ticking of the grandfather clock in the corner, Mulligan finally, carefully asks, “What happened?”

“Ugh,” Lafayette groans without replying, strips off his coat and flings it on the nearest couch. The shirt beneath is wrinkled, off-white, a veteran of too many battles. Mulligan makes a silent note to clean it before he goes, or better yet, replace it.

Perhaps ignoring Mulligan’s question entirely, Lafayette stares down at his own crumpled coat and bites his lip. He looks lost and betrayed —stricken, weighed down by disappointment — he looks unsteady, alone, unsure, and Hercules Mulligan is not a man who misses much.

“Is this about Washington?”

The flinch before Lafayette turns his head away is enough.

“Did he try to take advantage of you, Gil?” he demands, circling closer to see his face. “Because I swear if he did I don’t care what fucking army he commands, I’ll—”

“Hercules, no.” Lafayette lifts a hand, reaching out, then drops it before it can touch Mulligan’s arm. It hurts to see. He was never so hesitant as this. His eyes are averted, his smile a forced and painful twist of his soft, sad mouth. “It was more that he didn’t.”

Mulligan frowns, the better to conceal the sick, nervous turn of his stomach. “You…”

“I was an idiot,” Lafayette supplies, with a false cheer to cover up the viciousness he so easily inflicts upon himself. “And Washington made clear he has no— intentions, or desire, whatsoever. My mistake.” He ducks his chin and swallows, with some difficulty, the line of his jaw painfully tense.

“I’m sorry,” says Mulligan softly. It’s not quite true. He’s not sorry at all that Washington kept his hands off Lafayette, but he hates to see the pain it’s caused, the hunched-in shoulders and averted, grieving eyes. He’d regret anything that made Lafayette look like this.

Lafayette’s mouth thins for a moment, and he seems to bite hard on his lower lip before lifting his eyes to Mulligan’s and asking, “Did I make such a fool of myself to you as well?”

“No,” he says firmly, because secrecy be damned, there are things he can’t let slide. “Hey—look at me, man.” He waits until Lafayette does, and rests his knuckles gently under Lafayette’s chin, just the slightest touch so he won’t look away. “Not at all. It wasn’t like that.”

All at once, Lafayette seems to abandon the effort of holding up his head, letting the weight of it rest on Mulligan’s hand, eyes drifting shut.

“Well in that case.” Lafayette spreads his arms and tries to smile. “Pity a wretched Frenchman, will you? I can’t believe I’d make such a poor bedwarmer, given the chance.”

“It wouldn’t be pity,” says Mulligan before he can give it a second thought.

Lafayette’s lips part, startled; Hercules wants so badly to kiss him but owes him more.

“Gil, believe me. If I ever took you to my bed I’d be _grateful_ , I wouldn’t be able to fucking believe my luck.” His nerve fails him then, but only for a moment. “You’re beautiful.”

The stunned look still hasn't faded from Lafayette's face. “You... never said.”

“Well, yeah. All that time, I thought you were teasing me!”

“Oh, I was,” Lafayette reassures him. “Aside from getting Hamilton riled up in front of a crowd, it was my favorite game. But I still kept hoping to be taken up on the offer.”

It's more information than even Mulligan can take in at once, to think that they— that he could've—

He inhales, despite the sudden weakness of his lungs, and licks his lips. “Am I too late?”

Lafayette shakes his head mutely. Then, with a care Hercules has done nothing to deserve, Lafayette touches him, both palms warm on his chest and running down over his stomach, fingers spread wide over his shirt and still not nearly spanning the breadth of him, dwarfed by Mulligan’s bulk.

Mulligan finds himself breathless. It reminds him of just how much _bigger_ he is, despite Lafayette’s height—reminds him how he used to think about lifting Lafayette right off the ground and holding him up against a wall to be kissed. (Or wish he could interrupt torturous hours of flirting by gathering Lafayette onto his lap, cradling every lithe warm inch of him.)

“You,” he says, staring in helpless wonder at Lafayette, his prominent cheekbones, soft pink mouth and dark lashes, “are the prettiest person I’ve seen in my life.” He catches Lafayette’s hands in his and squeezes, grips Lafayette’s wrists to tug him closer. Mulligan runs his hands up the length of Lafayette’s arms, over his shoulders and neck until he cradles Lafayette’s face in his hands, close-trimmed beard prickling his palms, faint youthful softness of his cheeks beneath Mulligan’s thumbs.

“All right if we go to my bedroom?”

“Yes,” says Lafayette, though his eyes are startled and disbelieving, his thoughts ( _really? me?_ ) painfully plain to see. It is too much for Mulligan to tolerate. So he kisses Lafayette for the first time, as gently as he knows how to be, with soft, nearly chaste presses of his lips to every bit of Lafayette’s mouth, and tries to feel less than completely undone by it.

“Okay,” he says unsteadily, forehead still resting against Lafayette’s.

He puts an arm around Lafayette before taking a single step, unsure he could stop touching him if he tried, and is wretchedly grateful when Lafayette only leans into him. Their progress into the room is less than graceful, but it’s nothing compared to how off-balance Mulligan feels when he sees Lafayette on the edge of his bed. “I feel like I must be dreaming.”

“Have you—” Lafayette begins, then seems to waver as Mulligan sits down next to him; his eyes linger on the size of Mulligan’s shoulders. “You’ve dreamed this before?”

“Yeah. Can’t say I ever did you justice, though.”

Lafayette only stares at him with a mute sort of bewilderment, a perplexed half-smile on his lovely face. It’s as if he’s waiting for Mulligan to stop, or laugh, or disappear.

That won’t do.

“Can I—?” he asks, letting his touch linger at Lafayette’s carefully tied-back hair.

When Lafayette murmurs assent he tugs the ribbon free and sets it aside. With his hair a loose cloud around his face, a lot of the sharpness is taken from Lafayette’s features, making him a creature of candlelit shadows, smudged lines and dark eyes fixed on Mulligan, unwavering.

“There,” he says, stroking back Lafayette’s hair. “Good boy.”

The words slip out unintended—only after the fact does he realize they might sound cruel, condescending rather than the praise he meant to give—but Lafayette’s eyes drift blissfully shut and he presses his face into Mulligan’s hand, a soft sigh warm against his palm. Hercules stifles his own sigh of relief and leans down to kiss Lafayette’s forehead.

“Look at you,” he murmurs. Mulligan runs his thumb along Lafayette’s cheekbone, taking in the soft dark fan of his lashes against his skin, and—he can’t resist, his hand is drawn to touch Lafayette’s mouth, finds it soft and plush and welcoming, tongue flicking involuntarily against the weight of Mulligan’s fingertips. “Look at you,” he says again, a rumble low in his throat he scarcely recognizes. “So fucking beautiful.”

Lafayette whimpers softly and then flinches and presses his lips together as if he can take back the sound. Gentle and reassuring as he can be, Mulligan pushes him down onto the bed and angles closer, pressing a thigh between Lafayette’s legs for him to rut against—he never meant to tease the boy, only to savor every inch of him. Lafayette’s eyes are open now, dark and gleaming as he shifts the thickening bulge of his cock against Mulligan’s leg.

“I’m gonna take your clothes off,” he says, but he makes it a question by waiting, by the careful brush of his fingers over Lafayette’s cheek. Holding still over him until Lafayette nods, and a little longer until he’s pushed, impatiently, by long-fingered aristocratic hands, into action. He kisses that soft sweet mouth before lifting himself up off the mattress, for the pleasure of it and for the stunned hungry look on Lafayette’s face.

“What the fuck, Gil,” says Mulligan, low and teasing, hands tight on Lafayette’s hips before going for his trouser laces. “You know I’m gonna kiss you more than that.”

He doesn’t mean for it to bring that shuttered-off, uncertain look to Lafayette’s beautiful face; he never wanted that at all. “Yes?” says Lafayette, heartbreakingly hopeful.

“Hey. Of course I am.” For now he drops a kiss to Lafayette’s bare hip to prove it. He does the work himself, and loves it; he’s wanted to undress Lafayette for longer than bears mentioning and it seems that Lafayette is very willing to let it be done. He lifts up, twists and slithers out of things when guided to, but otherwise he is pliant under Hercules’ hands.

Since leaving he’s lost a little weight, and has a few new scars and scratches, but all in all the war has been kind to Lafayette. Mulligan savors him as he’s revealed, pressing kisses to Lafayette’s chest, his stomach, a recently bruised knee, his angular shoulder and the inside of his wrist. Every time, it seems to surprise Lafayette. Every time, he lingers just a little bit longer.

It’s easy to get addicted to how sensitive Lafayette is for everything, how beautifully he responds to every touch. He’s fucking gorgeous, long limbs and lithe muscle, arching his back when Mulligan strokes the back of his thighs. Lafayette groans softly, eyes half lidded, hands grabbing at the sheets, his pretty cock flushed dark, hard and leaking onto his belly.

He bites his lip, catching his breath or gathering his nerve before curling up toward Mulligan, weight braced on his hands. His eyes flicker uncertainly over Mulligan’s face. “You said…”

Instead of letting him finish, Mulligan kisses him straightaway. He gently buries his hands in Lafayette’s hair, just to hold him still, and coaxes Lafayette’s mouth open with kiss after kiss, licking slowly over his lower lip just to feel how fucking soft it is. He nips at it, gently, just after that, and he _really_ likes the way Lafayette clings to his shoulders and kisses him again.

Mulligan settles so he’s straddling Lafayette’s lap, not quite sitting on him — his legs are more than strong enough to hold him for a while, and it’s already hard enough to resist the urge to rut against Lafayette’s cock and let this be over far too soon. He traces his fingertips along Lafayette’s cheekbones again, curving over the line of his jaw and down his neck, stroking his collarbone. He experiments, then, with slipping his tongue past Lafayette’s lips and rubbing firmly at his nipples at the same time. The results are immediate and undeniable.

When Lafayette falls onto his back again, he’s open-mouthed, arching up a little as he gasps for lungfuls of air. He says something in broken French, throaty and completely incomprehensible, not that it makes Mulligan any less desperate to fuck him.

"So." He parts Lafayette's long, lean thighs, and strokes them while he's at it. “Have you ever…?”

“Several years ago now. And—” His eyes dart away, embarrassed. “I practiced.”

A low groan escapes Mulligan, and his eyes drift helplessly shut. If he had the patience to wait and have Lafayette touch himself— _Christ_ , just the thought of it makes him light-headed. “Hey,” he says belatedly, opening his eyes to frown even while nuzzling at the inside of Lafayette’s knee. “Nothing to be ashamed of.”

“No?” His lips are parted, swollen, begging to be kissed again, but he looks like he stopped noticing much of anything once he saw just how much Mulligan liked hearing that. Stunned, pleased, incredulous.

“No,” says Mulligan firmly, unable to stop stealing glances at Lafayette’s hands. He can just picture Lafayette opening himself up on those long clever fingers, night after night, gasping into the bedroll for his general, hips bucking, desperate to be held down by Washington’s steady certain hands and fucked, wishing and _wishing_ , only to be told—

And there Mulligan needs to stop, because he really ought not murder General Washington.

Instead he devotes himself to working Lafayette open with his own hands, watching his fingers press inside and getting him slick and stretched enough to take it. His cock twitches between his legs just watching Lafayette squirm and make those little breathy encouraging sounds. Mulligan probably spends more time on it than he needs to, but soon enough he's biting back a groan, hiking up Lafayette's leg and finally pushing inside him.

“You’re incredible. You are, fuck, I wanted you for years,” he confesses against the warm skin of Lafayette’s neck, before he stops and bites back a strangled shout because he’s pressing into the easy heat of Lafayette inch by inch and it feels so fucking good. “Tell me if you don’t like it. Just tell me and I’ll stop. Okay?”

“And if I like it very much,” counters Lafayette, arch as he can be while getting fucked, “will you give me more?”

Mulligan has to take a moment to compose himself before he says yes. He absolutely will.

He fucks Lafayette slowly, thoroughly, hard enough that the bedframe rattles and Lafayette’s eyes roll back into his head; it seems like a good start. After that, Mulligan keeps up the pace until Lafayette is whispering nonsense, thanking him, begging him until Mulligan stops it with a kiss and swallows every sound that follows, pressing his own thanks into Lafayette’s lips over and over. Mulligan kisses that mouth swollen, kisses him breathless, lingers and kisses with the gentlest possible brushes of his lips until Lafayette nearly sobs in his arms, trembling and full, and cannot possibly doubt that he is cherished.

“Hercules,” he breathes out, every syllable broken, and his hands tighten on Mulligan’s neck and shoulder. “Say it again.”

“Say what?” he asks, frowning and breathless, but when Mulligan sees the anguished flicker in those big brown eyes, anxiousness and shame and the lingering sting of rejection, he knows what Lafayette is asking him for. “Good boy,” he murmurs, gently as he knows how, nuzzling the words into Lafayette’s ear. “That’s it—that’s it, good boy—”

Lafayette comes like that, writhing between Mulligan and his mattress, soft choked-off cries that Mulligan strokes out of him, petting his sides until he’s still and gasping. Mulligan braces his arms on the mattress and carefully pulls out of Lafayette in an attempt to be polite, not expecting the wordless disappointed sound Lafayette makes at the loss.

“Don’t,” Lafayette finally manages. “You don’t have to stop.”

“It’s—” _fine_ , he means to say, before Lafayette reaches between them.

Even clumsy with just having come, his hands are something, working deftly along the shaft of Mulligan’s cock. “I can’t believe you fit inside me,” says Lafayette, breathless and matter-of-fact, and Mulligan groans and fucks into his palms, remembering how it felt to be buried between Lafayette’s thighs instead, wringing those desperate whines from his throat with every thrust—but this— this is _good_ , Lafayette stroking him eagerly, soft lips against his throat and long fingers dragged along his cock, just there—

Lafayette presses him onto his back just before he comes and keeps the heel of his hand on Mulligan’s cock, letting him make a splattered sticky mess all over himself. Before he can even form words to complain, Lafayette ducks his head and sets about licking the come from Mulligan’s belly. His mouth is still sinfully soft, hot tongue sliding along, lapping up the mess, and wet silky lips dropping kisses on damp skin.

He gently kisses clean Mulligan’s softening cock, heedless of his groan, and there’s a smile on Lafayette’s slick, reddened mouth when he glances up. “No?”

“ _Yes_ ,” he breathes, in no uncertain terms, as Lafayette stretches out alongside him again. “Fuck. Thank you.”

Lafayette kisses him first this time, confident enough in his welcome that Mulligan’s chest feels almost absurdly light and warm. He shuts his eyes and lets himself be surrounded by Lafayette, his hands steady on Mulligan’s shoulders, his hair spilling around their faces. Then, with that same beautiful certainty, Lafayette turns so his back is pressed against Mulligan’s chest and takes possession of Mulligan’s arm to drag it around him.

He runs his palm greedily over the warm skin and muscle of Lafayette’s chest, of his abdomen and sides, until Lafayette takes his arm again and keeps it, settling in against Mulligan’s pillow.

“I have a week,” he murmurs as Hercules drags the blankets over them.

“Hm.” Mulligan nudges enough hair aside to kiss his shoulder. “We might’ve left the bed by then.”

“Oh?”

“We’ll see.”

 


End file.
